NYT / Ret Judge Michael Luttig - (archived: https://archive.ph/ew0yD ) It’s Trump vs. the Courts, and It Won’t End Well for Trump
March 23, 2025, 7:00 a.m. ET
By J. Michael Luttig
Judge Luttig was appointed by President George H.W. Bush and served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit from 1991 to 2006.
President Trump has wasted no time in his second term in declaring war on the nation’s federal judiciary, the country’s legal profession and the rule of law. He has provoked a constitutional crisis with his stunning frontal assault on the third branch of government and the American system of justice. The casualty could well be the constitutional democracy Americans fought for in the Revolutionary War against the British monarchy 250 years ago.
Mr. Trump has yearned for this war against the federal judiciary and the rule of law since his first term in office. He promised to exact retribution against America’s justice system for what he has long mistakenly believed is the federal government’s partisan “weaponization” against him.
It’s no secret that he reserves special fury for the justice system because it oversaw his entirely legitimate prosecution for what the government charged were the crimes of attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election and purloining classified documents from the White House, secreting them at Mar-a-Lago and obstructing the government’s efforts to reclaim them. He escaped the prosecutions by winning a second term, stopping them in their tracks.
But unless Mr. Trump immediately turns an about-face and beats a fast retreat, not only will he plunge the nation deeper into constitutional crisis, which he appears fully willing to do, he will also find himself increasingly hobbled even before his already vanishing political honeymoon is over.
The bill of particulars against Mr. Trump is long and foreboding. For years Mr. Trump has viciously attacked judges, threatened their safety, and recently he called for the impeachment of a federal judge who has ruled against his administration. He has issued patently unconstitutional orders targeting law firms and lawyers who represent clients he views as enemies. He has vowed to weaponize the Department of Justice against his political opponents. He has blithely ignored judicial orders that he is bound by the Constitution to follow and enforce.
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